While You Were Out An Intimate Family Portrait of Mental Illness in an Era of Silence

Meg Kissinger

eAudio - 2023

From award-winning journalist Meg Kissinger, a searing memoir of a family besieged by mental illness, as well as an incisive exploration of the systems that failed them and a testament to the love that sustained them.Growing up in the 1960s in the suburbs of Chicago, Meg Kissinger's family seemed to live a charmed life. With eight kids and two loving parents, the Kissingers radiated a warm, boisterous energy. Whether they were spending summer days on the shores of Lake Michigan, barreling down the ski slopes, or navigating the trials of their Catholic school, the Kissingers always knew how to live large and play hard.But behind closed doors, a harsher reality was unfolding—a heavily medicated mother hospitalized for anxiety and depre...ssion, a manic father prone to violence, and children in the throes of bipolar disorder and depression, two of whom would take their own lives. Through it all, the Kissingers faced the world with their signature dark humor and... more